


you're by my side, but are you still with me

by laloose (Vacant_Ghostgirl)



Category: Gorillaz
Genre: 2d and murdoc still have a fucked up relationship but what else is new, Gen, Post Plastic Beach, everyones sad and some of them eat bagels to cope, identity crisis, im tired ill fix these tags later, my sweet lost violent child, phase 4, robot identity crisis the best kind, some real ass.... blade runner shit, this is just going to be like maybe 20k of me figuring out phase 4 with cyborg in it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-07
Updated: 2018-01-25
Packaged: 2019-01-10 02:00:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 14,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12288840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vacant_Ghostgirl/pseuds/laloose
Summary: “You know how I feel about this,” Noodle said after a long silence. The words echoed in the stairwell, difficult and uncomfortable. 2D shifted his weight from one leg to the other.“She’s not you,” He murmured, aware he was walking into very unstable territory. Noodle’s gaze slid back to him with a razor’s edge, controlled and dangerous.“She was meant to be,” She said shortly.End of discussion.





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> this has been sitting in my drafts for like. i wanna say 2 years. i saw them perform at the forum yesterday and it was the greatest concert of my life, so i went home and wrote the rest of it. i love cyborg and i always thought the logistics of her character were so interesting but left unexplored. here is........ a lot of that lol. thanx 4 reading :)

2D went out to the balcony to indulge in two habits that had only grown worse since his arrival to Plastic Beach: to smoke, and to be by himself.

 

When he flicked the zippo open and held the fire up to the fag, he had to curve his calloused hands over the warm flame to shield it from the ocean breeze that incessantly blew up from the breach below. Once the cigarette was lit, 2D took a long, long drag, and then puffed the smoke out away from the balcony, watching it dissipate slowly over the endless churning waves. 

 

Dusk on the island was both a mercy and a curse. The air cooled down from the hot humidity of the daytime, and outside access allowed him to slip away from the grasps of the glorified landfill’s other inhabitants if only for a little amount of time. But being atop the structure and looking out to a sea that seemed to be endless in every direction was like a madness, and the isolation and weight of the empty space surrounding him seemed to ironically close in on him in a claustrophobic way if he stayed out for too long.  The sun was setting slowly in a blazing haze over the horizon line of the ocean, a burning combination of pinks and oranges spinning out wildly into the sky. 2D could hear the swells crashing against each other below where his legs hung over the edge of the balcony, and for a fleeting moment, he thought about how easy it would be to rise to his feet, and simply dive the long way down into the frigid breach. Cold water rushing into his lungs. Salt water burning his eyes. Sinking like a rock to the ocean floor, surrounded by leagues of darkness and nothing. A deafening silence after months and months of the the sound of the shore, in and out, repeating even in his sleep. The cycle of an endless white noise. 

 

2D took another drag, and pinched the bridge of his nose. 

 

“Yer losin’ it, Stu,” He mumbled.

 

“What have you lost?”

 

The voice came from a foot behind him. 2D jumped in shock, flailing sharply, and when he looked over the edge of the concrete, he could just see the tiny white dot of his cigarette falling down, down, down into the briny depths until it disappeared from his line of sight, blending into the waves.

 

“That was my last—,” he said, and stopped. He knew who it was, but he made no motion to greet them. A long moment passed.  

 

“2D.”

 

The voice was closer. 2D turned.

 

Cyborg Noodle stood tall over him, her stoic features framed by the tie dye sky behind her, guns strapped to her legs and across her back carelessly. Though she wore the face of the long gone guitarist, her disposition and programming claimed control over her mannerisms, and 2D could see in her eyes a stillness, and an anger that would have never been present in the girl the robot was modeled after, but was always present in her creator. She blinked owlishly.

 

“You dropped your cigarette into the ocean,” she said. 

 

2D sighed. Her ability to talk was fairly new to him. He was unsure if this was Murdoc’s doing, or if she had always been programmed to speak to begin with and had simply chosen not to until recently. Either way, he had never seen her talk to anyone outside of when they were alone, and when she did, her speech was limited. The first time it happened, 2D had felt like a cement block was being slowly lowered onto his chest. It was the wrong voice to the wrong face. He was both exhausted and hyperaware of everything, and he didn’t want to look at her.

 

“I did,” He said, and his own voice sounded foreign to him. 

 

“He wanted me to report where you were, and what you were doing.” She didn’t specify who he was. She didn’t need to.

 

2D closed his eyes.

 

“ ‘M on the balcony. ‘M havin a smoke. When it gets dark, I’ll probably go back inside.” Back down to the lower levels, with the whale, and the prescriptions. He flinched. Oddly enough, so did the cyborg.

 

“That’s sufficient,” She replied. 2D turned back to the ocean. After a few seconds, he waited for the sound of her heavy combat boots to tromp back to the door to slide it open, and for him to be alone again, engulfed by the dusk. 

 

The sound never came.

 

When 2D moved to look at her again, her face was unreadable, but her hands were clenched into fists, and her legs were stiff like her limbs had been stuck to the concrete with glue. Something dark had passed over her features, and through her choppy bangs, conflict twisted her face. He wondered briefly if she was malfunctioning, and squinted up at her.

 

The glare she gave him in response was murderous.

 

“I am going to wait to report this information,” She said slowly, “Because he is not presently fully functional.”

 

Understanding dawned over 2D, and a familiar feeling crept through his stomach. She was waiting to go back inside because she was frustrated. She was frustrated because inside the structure, Murdoc Niccals was drinking himself to death. For a strange moment, the singer wondered if the bassist had really asked her to report to him at all, or if she had simply lied about her task to be excused for being outside while he was inside, a drunken mess. Could she do that? Was that a choice she could make?

 

Cyborg fidgeted.

 

The silence was long and heavy. Seagulls called on the shore below.

 

The robot sat.

 

“I am going to ask you something.” She said calmly, “I want you to answer the most truthfully that you are able to. I am… curious...about it.”

 

2D paused. When he looked at the cyborg, she was staring into him intently, synthetic hands clutching the ledge where she leaned. It was jarring. He shrugged. She took this as a positive answer. He could have never guessed the words that came out of her mouth next, and when she spoke them, it permeated the air like a dull ache.

 

“What was my original like?”

 

2D stared at her. The balcony seemed to shift, and then set itself back again. 

 

“I haven’t been able to find any…,” She started, and bizarrely, trailed off to start the sentence anew. “I know she was important to you and him both. I want you to tell me what she was like.” Her voice was almost angry. 

 

2D felt a pain coming on in the back of his head, and vaguely wondered where he’d last placed his pain killers. Cyborg was glaring holes into him, and he felt something in her gaze— it was searching. Desperate. Everything was far away. He closed his eyes.

 

“She was good,” He said finally. The statement fell short of what he wanted to really say, what there really was to convey about the younger girl’s person. He pulled his knees up to his chest. Below them, the waves lapped at the artificial shore. He thought, nothing in this place was really real. None of it belonged here.

 

The robot’s eyes darted across his face, and she frowned. “That’s all?” 

 

2D took a deep, shuddering breath. He thought about—  _ her _ , a time before Point Nemo, sitting in a home that was now ashes and pointing at something exciting on the TV— a hollow part of his chest opened up. The memories made him ache. As of late, as horribly guilty as it made him feel, he didn’t allow himself to think about Kong, and the guitarist, and their old drummer, both now replaced with machines. Old wounds hastily scabbed over and ignored in a haze of pills and sleep. There wasn’t much to do on Plastic Beach. He slept a lot. He wondered what Murdoc did, all this free time. Then he remembered the alcohol.

 

“I thought there would be more,” The android said next to him, and she sounded a little more than frustrated. He shook his head.

 

“No, there’s… there is. It’s just…” When he opened his eyes, the endless ocean greeted him across the vast horizon. The cyborg was waiting. “She was clever, and… kind. She saw beauty in everything. She really… she believed there was good… in everyone. Even though she was sad sometimes… I think she loved all of it. Everything. Her music, and… us. The band. Where we were.” 2D closed his hands into fists, and pulled them up close to his chest, tucking them behind his knees. The ache in his head was worse now, blossoming in the front of his head. “It’s hard to talk about. I don’t know if you would understand.” 

 

He felt her flinch next to him. They didn’t speak for a long time. He wondered if he had hurt her with what he’d said. You’re a robot. You’re nothing like her. You wouldn’t understand, because you can’t. Artificial machinery. Stolen DNA. When she spoke, her voice was hardened.

 

“I know that you hate me.”

 

2D’s eyes widened. 

 

“You don’t have to pretend,” She continued. Her tone was quiet, but firm. He’d never heard her talk like this. The subject itself was taboo, but apparent. “I look like her. I know that I do. You— both you, and him, you stare at me in this way. You think I don’t notice.” When 2D turned to look at her, Cyborg’s gaze was cemented to her boots, her fingernails digging into the sides of her forearms. “I’m not stupid. I know what I am. A replacement. You don’t even like it when I play her guitar.”

 

A weight dropped in his gut. He thought of the other day, glaring at the robot in the studio as she ran her hands over the fender of the yellow Telecaster. He’d wanted to shout at her. Now, sitting atop the plastic structure, looking out onto the edge of the ocean, he felt… hollow. Empty. It didn’t matter. It was just an instrument. 

 

2D was suddenly acutely aware that this was the most he had ever heard the robot consecutively speak. The entire interaction was bizarre and foreign. A silence fell between them.

 

“Why did you ask?” He said after a while.

 

The android turned to him carefully. 2D shifted his weight. Her face changed, and all at once she was stoic again, glaring at him through emotionless eyes.  

 

“Don’t stay out here too long,” She said finally, and pushed herself up from the ledge, standing to face the salty ocean breeze that breached the shore. “It isn’t safe.” The android walked away with all of the tension she had brought with her out on the balcony. 2D watched her leave, still slightly on edge in the wake of their odd interaction. From behind, for a moment, he could almost imagine she was Noodle, walking away from him like she had for the very last time. It was unbelievably selfish. But, like waves receding upon a shore, the thought washed over him for only briefly, and he was left numb again, and he was alone again.

 

“That was my last ciggie,” He thought to himself miserably.  

  
  
.  
  


 

 

 

 

.

 

 

 

 

.

 

 

 

 

 

.

 

 

 

 

.

 

 

 

 

.

The tide was low, and Plastic Beach was burning.

 

A thick, billowing smell like lit gasoline on Barbie dolls rose through the air in hot, horrible waves. All around, nameless black helicopters were crashing, and a siren pervaded the quiet of the sea in a slow but consistent shriek, fading in and out from where it originated atop the momentous plastic structure jutting out of the sea. The sky bled through in dark reds and oranges, clouds circled the landmass like a storm was beginning to start, and in the middle of it all, a girl once named Noodle gazed down upon the crew of people that had gathered at the forefront of the shiny pink wasteland. Somewhere, a whale was dying, a singer was shaking in the depths of a plastic prison, and Murdoc Niccals was sprinting up, up, up the steps of a spiral stairwell. 

 

It had been dark in the mouth of the drummer. Her eye was beginning to hurt again. 

 

“Where,” She spoke, and her voice was raspy from disuse. The pacific sun beat down over them, and she raised one arm to shade her eyes, squinting down at the painted trash that spread out before her into a tropical wasteland. “Where. Is. He.” 

 

Black copters flanked the island, and Russel held his hand up for her to jump down into and crouch against the wind, the whirring of the blades harsh in her ears.

 

“There’s still a few more,” the drummer said lowly. He lowered the girl down on to the Plastic shore, and held his arm up to shade his eyes as Noodle had done. “I think they’re on their way back. We gotta move quick.”

 

The crowd that stood at the edge of the beach parted for her as Russel lowered his gargantuan hand on to the shoreline and allowed her to hop down onto the pink plastic island. Even though the masses around them were crumbling, her demeanor remained as passive and calm as it had been for the past two years. The garbage that made up the ground burned the edges of her feet as she walked swiftly and quietly to the entrance of the structure. No one said a word. They watched her in silent awe as she went, and she knew as she passed every face, peering out from under her mask, that she would be responsible for saving none of them. There were two people she had come here for, and only one of them she wanted to save.

 

“Keep them busy,” She said to Russel, and hauled open the metal door to the building before ducking inside. 

 

She dreams about it, sometimes. She dreams about this day. She can remember how dry her mouth was, how hot the sun felt on her choppy black hair, the way the saltwater in the breeze whipped around her as she ascended the staircase to the top in her search efforts. Inside the structure was dark, and bright emergency lights blinked everywhere in the black, illuminating the room in small doses, bathing the furniture in a violent red light. Noodle could faintly hear the explosions going on by the beach, and she had to hold the railing and feel around in the dark for support as the building shook from the aftershock of whatever battle was commencing outside. It sounded like the end of everything. The stairs seemed to go on forever. When she finally exited to the top floor, Noodle could smell the smoke even from where she was running inside the studio. 

 

Each room she ran through was worse than the last. Everywhere, there was garbage piled up against the walls, rooms vandalized and trashed, the long ignored messes of musicians and collaborators shoved into corners and spread out into hallways and on to carpets. The alarm blared throughout each space, and she found herself jumping over toppled over furniture and abandoned instruments. Someone’s coffee sat still steaming on a countertop— she was rooting through a tropical Chernobyl, the maze of rooms leading her up, up, up. 

 

The hatch was difficult to open. It took her two tries before it swung free, and the harsh, searing light of the island sun blinded her for just a second before her eyes adjusted to the endless blue sky of the top of the structure. She vaulted her weight onto the hot surface of the balcony, and squinted out over the railing. The noise behind her made her hesitate.

 

It took her a moment to identify. It was a sound she had not heard up close in a very long time, but when it finally registered, she stopped short, and froze.

 

It was the click of a safety being turned off.

 

She had to pick her next words carefully. Her anger was fraying her nerves, but she took a deep breath, and calmed herself. He was here. Her gaze out over the horizon was level. 

 

“You know how I feel about guns,” She said quietly. 

 

Murdoc’s voice was hoarse when he spoke. It sounded like he’d been doing a lot of shouting.

 

“Tell me you’re not here with them,” He said roughly, and she turned around.

 

He didn’t look all that different to her. It had been four year since she’d last laid eyes on the bassist, and though the lines in his face had grown deeper, the set of his jaw mirrored the exact mental image she’d held in her mind of it for a lifetime. The ocean breeze pulled at them both from the balcony, and his hat flew off of his head, revealing Murdoc’s look of surprise, and the even stare he had her fixated with from one angry red eye. 

 

He lowered the gun.

 

“Bleedin’ Christ,” He rasped. “It’s really you.”

 

A helicopter whirled past the building, shocking them both out of the moment. Noodle raised her arms to her face, but the copter bypassed them both— it seemed to be preoccupied with something at the base of the island, and distantly, Noodle could make out machine gunfire, and people screaming. 

 

“We don’t have time for this,” She said quickly, regaining her composure. “Where is he.”

 

Murdoc was looking over the balcony wildly towards where the copter had fled. He wasn’t even listening to her.

 

She had forgotten this, the way he was. An anger filled her gut like lead, and when she spoke again, she was nearly shouting. “Murdoc!”

 

Murdoc turned. 

 

“2D,” She drew out. “Where is 2D.”

 

He had the audacity to laugh. It was high and cruel.

 

“Don’t tell me you came all the way here to whisk away faceache! He’s probably in the basement where I left him, wetting his trousers.” Murdoc squinted down at the island, putting a hand over his eyes to shield them from the sun. “Is that  _ Russel _ ?”

 

Her fists clenched.

 

“Take me to him,” She demanded. 

 

There was an explosion at the base of the island, and Murdoc turned back to stare at her. This time, his eyes didn’t leave her. 

 

He’d gotten old. She could see grey hairs hidden in the mop of his head, and his teeth had somehow gotten even more horrible. She could see them, yellowed and chipped when he snarled. There it was, the whiplash of his mood. She’d been waiting for it.

 

“Just ‘cause you’re bigger now doesn’t mean you can order me about, love,” He hissed.

 

She figured she’d been patient long enough. 

 

Noodle’s fist collided with his nose in a way that was nearly comical. She could hear it break in the way it had a dozen times before, and it felt like meeting an old friend. Blood poured from his nose like a faucet, and he squawked and sprawled backwards, surprise evident in his face.

“Noodle!” He blubbered through the blood. “Fer fuck’s sake!”

 

She pressed her foot down on his chest and leaned over him. Murdoc blanched.

 

“You’re going to take me to 2D,” She said, her voice stony. “And then I’m leaving this place. And I don’t care what you do after that.”

 

The machinegun fire on the base of the island had stopped. Murdoc held his nose in his hands, but his eyes flicked past her to the right, and the expression he made gave Noodle pause for a moment before she began to slowly turn to see what he’d been looking at.

 

She didn’t have to turn at all, in the end. Two hands clamped around her arms like iron cuffs and lifted her effortlessly off of the ground, and with the same amount of casualness, threw her across the balcony. 

 

The cement was hot when she landed on it. 

 

“Took you bloody long enough!” She heard Murdoc say to no response. There was a ringing in her ears, and where she’d landed on her arm felt numb and prickling— in a few moments it would be burning with the pain of the scrape. “Oy! Are you even listening?”

  
  


The dread was pooling in her stomach, now— burning liquid stomach acid. Her eye throbbed. Understanding dawned on her, the identity of the third person on the roof. She knew what she would see when she sat up. She’d heard of her, of that  _ thing _ that he’d made after she’d gone. 

 

She rolled over, struggled to her feet. Squinted up into the sunlight to view her attacker. She’d been waiting for this. She’d been waiting.

 

The robot’s wore Noodle’s face in a wide, feral grin, and when Noodle— the real Noodle— raised her eyes to look into her own reflecting back at her, the cyborg’s smile froze in a nightmarish way. It was worse than anything she could have prepared for. Weapons were strapped to the robot’s legs and back, and Murdoc sat on the roof looking between them in a way that looked almost indignantly frightened. Noodle felt as if the building was already collapsing underneath them.

 

“You,” She tried, but the cyborg moved, took a step forward and reached for a gun strapped behind her shoulder. Her grin had faded away. Nothing showed on her face but blank shock. Noodle tried again, pushing past the anger she was feeling. Watching the imitation move was making bile rise up in her throat.

 

“Murdoc,” She said. “Tell it to stand down.”

 

For a moment, nothing existed between them but the sound of gunfire on the beach below. 

 

The Cyborg moved faster than than Noodle thought possible. One moment she was across the roof, and the next she was up close to her, tackling her to the ground. Everything about her was even more horrible up close. She snarled and grabbed at Noodle’s arm, and then slammed her metal fist into the cement where Noodle’s head had just been. 

 

They wrestled on the hot cement for a few seconds before the she managed to throw the robot off of her. She was only up for a second before gunfire struck the ground by her feet, Cyborg Noodle firing off one of the pistols that had been strapped to her leg. Noodle leapt across the roof, dodging the bullets before the round ran out and the cyborg tossed the useless gun to the side, reaching for the secondary weapon on her other leg. The seconds it took to grab them were too long, though, and Noodle ran at her with her arm raised, wailing her in the side of her head where the bullet hole in her forehead rested.

 

It was like punching a bowling ball. Her knuckles exploded with pain, but the robot fell to her knees, her sore spot from the shotgun shell crackling with sparks. 

 

Noodle looked down at the malfunctioning thing below her. Then she curled her fingers around the cyborg’s neck, and lifted her off of the ground.

 

“How could you make this horrible thing,” She said, and her voice was thick. A hot, tropical wind whirled around them, and she closed her eyes, not wanting to look at her own face staring back at her.

 

What happened next shook Noodle to her core.

 

It spoke.

 

“Don’t kill me,” It croaked. 

 

She nearly dropped it in shock. Her eyes widened beneath her mask, and she whipped her head around to face Murdoc, who still lay sprawled motionless on the ground, mouth gaping open in abstract surprise and eyes impossibly wide.

“It can speak?” Noodle said, more incredulous than angry. The rage that had moved her across the roof to fight her double earlier had come to a standstill within her, and she could feel the robot struggling in her grip idly, coughing up thick black battery acid and twitching as her circuits shorted.

 

“I didn’t know that she,” was all Murdoc could respond, eyes shifting from the real Noodle to the synthetic one in panic. He seemed to be frozen in place. When Noodle turned to face the cyborg again, she could tell it— she?— was fading. Her resistance was thinning, and dead eyes that once gazed out upon the sea seemed to grow more and more desperate in the face of her destruction.

 

“Don’t kill me,” she repeated again. “Don’t kill me. Don’t kill me.” 

 

“Where did you learn that?” Noodle asked quietly. A lick of anger sparked in her gut. “Did he teach you this?”

 

“I did it— myself,” the robot struggled. “I fixed myself.” Her gloved hands were tightening on the arm that strangled her. “I knew how to.  _ We _ knew how to.”

 

Noodle stared. Her grip was slackening. There was a pause. “You gave yourself a voice,” she said.

 

When the android spoke again, her reply was distorted, and it was quieter. The wind whipped around the both of them atop the plastic monument, and somewhere in the distance, the siren stopped. “No one else was going to,” she choked.

 


	2. 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i left this alone for a minute but god knows why i woke up this morning and wrote all of the parts to connect the bits i'd already written so here it is!! i have a lot of the next chapter too bc of that so tbh next one shouldn't be that far along.  
> anyways cyborg has Inherited Snark from her bad dad™️ and i actually had so much fun w noodle's character here. not sure how much i like her phase 4 characterization because the noodle we've always had before now is a Strictly No Chill Zone and now she talks like a well adjusted adult and not an orphaned government war experiment who was brainwashed and then adopted by 3 Dads who love her. anyways a lot of murdoc and 2d in the next part! stay tuned

 

 

 

 

 

Noodle opened her eyes.

 

A dark, nervous feeling had coiled itself into the pit of her stomach as she slept— sirens, there were sirens, the rush of water in her ears like blood in her head, and a terrible mask— she always felt more tired than she had before she went to sleep after the nightmares. Streams of white morning light were filtering in through the dusty curtains, and she took a deep, deep breath as the dream faded from her consciousness like a haze of mist receding off of a shore.

 

A bad metaphor. Try to stray from the sea for a moment.

 

The sheets were tangled around her ankles, and she could feel her hair sticking to her face, and the lines on her arms where the blankets had made soft indents into her skin. The hum of the AC unit buzzed lowly by the window, mirroring the slow, cyclic rounds of the ceiling fan above her. The patterns of sight and noise eased her into awareness of the morning. She closed her eyes again. There was no ocean. There were no sirens. Not anymore. London. She clenched her slender fingers into the palms of her hands, her fingernails bit too far down to the quick to ever leave a mark on her skin.

 

She was in London.

 

The knock on her window startled her.

 

“Ah— one second!” She called, her voice hoarse, and rolled herself out of bed. The bruises on her sides were only a ghost of what they had been when she arrived to the flat, and their dull green tint across her pale ribs only gave her a moment’s pause before she pulled a jumper over her head and flattened her hair down in the back with her palms (useless, really— it would stick up anyway. Russell normally cut her hair when she was small, but now he was big, too big, and 2D— while operating with the intentions of a good heart— couldn’t be trusted with scissors). Her floor was covered in weeks worth of clothes, and she pulled a random set of shorts out from the pile of laundry by the bathroom door to pull them quickly on.

 

The window in her room was prone to jamming. It took her three hard tugs before it jimmied loose, and she stuck her head out of the bedroom to look up towards the roof of the building, squinting into the morning sun. Cars drove by slowly on the street below her, but if they were distracted by what they saw above them, they didn’t stop. She smiled. The breeze was cold, and it pulled her hair out of her face.

 

“Good morning, Russell.”

 

Russell was still enormous. They had considered a number of options as to where he could stay as he shrank slowly, day by day, down to his original size, but in the end he seemed to be content to stay on the roof of the flat until he could eventually fit back inside of it. Murdoc had claimed to know some satanic ritual, a voodoo trick he had picked up in the early 90s to turn Russell smaller in a shorter amount of time, but the group— or rather, Noodle— was adamant on keeping Murdoc’s demonic pacts to a minimum since the uneasy defeat of the Boogieman, and an incident that had occurred in the band’s earlier days where Murdoc had tried to use dark magic to fix the carburetor in the Geep, and had ended up sealing a dark spirit in the engine of the vehicle. The exorcism took days, and Noodle had gotten a cut on her arm that needed stitches in the process. Russell had been furious. 2D didn’t talk to the bassist for days. She’d been so quick to forgive Murdoc back then, even with the stitches still in her arm.

 

Noodle’s hand floated over her ribs to where she could feel the aches of the fading bruises.

 

“How are you?” She asked. Russell shrugged, a tired smile forming on his face, and raised his hand to pulls his fingers across the underside of his jaw, pointing his thumb out away from him.

 

_‘Better.’_

 

Noodle nodded, and pulled her thumb out from her chin, pointing her fingers at the two of them.

 

‘ _Not speaking today?_ ’

 

He shook his head.

 

“Do you want me to bring you anything?” She called, concern blooming in her voice. He smiled, but shook his head again. Noodle frowned.

 

“Alright,” She said warily. “I’ll come up at lunch so we can meditate, alright?”

 

Russell nodded, and then with an expression Noodle had a difficult time reading, moved his hands slowly so that she could understand.

 

_‘2D was smoking up here again last night.’_

 

Noodle felt something uncomfortable creep up her arms. Her fingers clenched tighter to the window frame, and she sighed.

 

“I’ll,” She started, and then stopped. A black bird cawed from the tree across the way, and she watched it fly over the street to the second floor ledge of the flat before disappearing through the window to where Murdoc’s room would be. Russell seemed to want to say something. His stare was heavy on her shoulders.

 

“Well, I’ll be up in a bit then,” She said hesitantly, and gave him one last look before ducking back inside of her room.

  
  
  
  
  


The electric chair was already at the bottom of the stairwell when Noodle left her bedroom, which meant Murdoc had already skulked down to the depths of the basement to be alone with the records, the radio station, and all of the alcohol he could sneak past Noodle into the house. She stopped in front of his bedroom doorway on the way down to the kitchen and stood outside of it for a long moment before tugging her slippers over her feet and making her way down to the first floor.

 

2D was already sitting down at the table when she walked into the room. He was smoking a cigarette, and the ash of it had been pulled all the way to the filter, pieces of it dropping down to make marks on the finish of the wood. He was staring out the window, and he wasn’t smiling.

 

When she looked at him, her heart felt heavy with worry. She tried to push past the feeling as best she could.

 

“Morning,” She said warmly, opening the cabinet to grab some bowls & narrowly avoiding knocking over a pile of what she assumed were outdated music magazines. 2D mumbled something in response— he had never been a morning person, and it was a little comforting to know that some things hadn’t changed in the years they’d been separated. At least she still recognized this part of him, even if the other parts had become foreign to her.

 

The fridge was a bit more of a disaster then she had previously remembered. The milk was on the edge of souring, and there was a medley of disturbing items inhabiting the shelves that she wasn’t positive even needed refrigeration—  a pickled monkey’s paw, four tupperwares of what looked like blood, and a briny, moldy boot all sat together on the same rack like the world’s most depressing testament to satanism she had ever seen. She’d have to take a trip to the shop in the next few days. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw 2D get up to open the cupboard under the sink to grab the cereal, and shriek when a gaggle of bats emerged from the dark hiding spot. He waved his arms about and slammed the cabinet shut.

 

Alright. Sometime later today, maybe.

 

“It’s like a mad house, this place,” He said miserably.  

 

Almost on queue, a thump sounded from the basement, and a noise like an elephant trumpeting followed by a shout was heard quite clearly through the floorboards.

 

“I’ll get it,” 2D sighed, explaining nothing. Noodle was still deciding if she even wanted to ask before he opened the door to the cellar and slipped quietly down the stairs.

 

 

 

She was alone in the kitchen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the ocean, she had dreamt of Kong.

 

From a practical perspective, it hadn’t been a suitable place for a child to grow up, but she hadn’t been a normal child—  she was violent and suspicious and searching, and after all of what she’d feared of the real world as a child unfurled itself to be true, Kong was a fortress where she could be at peace with three strangers who turned out to be the last thing she’d expected to find: her family.

 

Back then, she owned a lot of VHS tapes, and there were a lot of corny movies where this occurred in them: cartoons finding homes, people they belonged to, where they loved and were loved. それは私です, Noodle would think, watching them on the old VCR while she lay on the floor. That's me. I came out of the post, out of that box, and now this place is mine. When they went on tour, even though each tour was a vision, she would ache for the zombie-riddled grounds of the studio. Her family was strange and small but she loved each of them in a way she had never even thought that she could. She’d kept something hidden away before she left Japan— something small and terribly guarded, buried deep under training and terror— and when she’d met the band it was as if she cold hold it in her hands then, and it would grow, and she could heal.

 

Noodle had come back from Hell, and gone to find the lot where Kong had been riddled with ash and debris— nothing but a few stray zombies roaming through the charred remains of the building. The air was heavy with smoke, even though it looked as though the disaster had happened months ago.

 

But in the ocean— in the ocean she remembered. The sky would be black and the waves would lap at Russel’s shoulders but she would lie on his head and remember the feeling of coming back home after having been gone a long while and dropping all of her bags on the floor to Murdoc’s protest, and running down the halls like if she didn’t look at everywhere in the house she’d missed, it would disappear without her seeing it. Once she had gotten ill and she’d curled up in 2D’s bed, shivering and pale, and even though Russel had warned him 2D had refused to leave her side, slept there next to her and brought her video games and then he’d gotten sick too. Russel had bring them both soup while they sweated out the fever. They had Christmas there once, and Murdoc chopped down a tree from a park because he wasn’t allowed in any of the local lots that sold them anymore, and they’d decorated it with popcorn on strings. Russel would read to her sometimes on the couch. Murdoc taught her how to exorcise a poltergeist. 2D playing slow chords on the piano as she strummed along in time. Not for an album, or anyone listening. Just so they could play together. They understood that music had brought them away from a terrible thing, and into a wonderful one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She should have known, then. That it wouldn’t keep.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Noodle was pulling her sneakers on when she heard the sound of the floorboards creaking from behind the basement door, and 2D slipped quietly back into the kitchen.

 

“I’m going to the store,” She said. “For groceries. Do you want anything special? I’ll get you a kinder egg.” 2D loved kinder eggs. She’d had a whole collection of the toys lined up on her windowsill as a child, and at night she liked to turn them around so that they faced the night, not for any real reason at all.

 

The frontman didn’t say anything. He seemed to hesitate, and there was a nervous air about him.

 

Noodle paused. She put her foot back down to the floor from where she’d been tugging on the back loop. “2D?”

 

“He’s asking for her,” He mumbled, looking down at the floor to avoid her eyes.

 

At first, Noodle didn’t understand at all. When it dawned on her finally, she went rigid. A muscle in her jaw twitched, and all the warm air seemed sucked out of the room.

 

Deep upstairs, an unpleasant aura loomed down the hall, the darkness leaking under the door through bright flashes of electrical sparks.

 

“Why?” She drew out finally. There was an uncomfortable feeling making its way up the back of her neck, and she had to bite at the inside of her cheek to force it to recede. 2D shrugged. He hadn’t asked, she thought. He’d probably been sent to fetch the replica so many times, the reasons must’ve stopped being important, after a while.

 

“I don’t think it was just to order her about. He sounded like he’d really wanted to ask her something,” 2D replied finally, sounding strangely guilty. He picked at the thread of his t-shirt. “‘S what I figured, though.”

 

_Ask her what? Why not ask me?_

 

“You know how I feel about this,” She said after a long silence. The words echoed in the stairwell, difficult and uncomfortable. 2D shifted his weight from one leg to the other.

 

“She’s not you,” He murmured, aware he was walking into very unstable territory. Noodle’s gaze slid back to him with a razor’s edge, controlled and dangerous.

 

“She was meant to be,” She said shortly.

 

End of discussion.

 

“I’ll,” 2D started, but she stopped him abruptly. Her pulse was racing.

 

“No.” And then: “I’ll get her. Stay here.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The walk to the fourth floor was long. She took her time.

 

Not once had Noodle set foot into the place where they’d placed— it, that aborted thing Murdoc had brought into this world with all of the reckless abandon she’d come to expect from him in her years of knowing exactly how he considered the consequences to his actions. Not at all, and sometimes with active distaste. They’d put it in the old office, shoved the enormous generator they’d replaced the old one with into a room too small for it to fit comfortably, and left it here— her there, as well, the thing— to sleep for what Noodle was now counting in her head as 4 weeks. To her knowledge, the robot hadn’t woken once. There was a button, on a machine across the room from the generator. Murdoc had showed it to her the morning they’d piled everything into the flat, a nail sticking out of his mouth as he hammered some chords up to the wall so they wouldn’t tangle on the floor.

 

“As long as she’s plugged into this, she’ll be on standby. The button is to power her on.” He’d considered the cyborg then, her damaged parts and crackling sparks in her head, the marks around her neck, and said flatly, “Not a good idea to be doing that any time soon, though.”

 

Noodle hadn’t said anything in return. She hadn’t been speaking to Murdoc, then. She had lost track of whether she was on speaking terms with him now, either.

 

The stairs were a wreck. She pushed past an ottoman that seemed to have been thrown down from the flight above, and found herself at the threshold of the office doorway. Inside, she could hear the hum of the machine, and she took a deep, solid breath before slowly taking the knob and opening the door.

 

Warm air greeted her. The room was dark, the curtains drawn over the one window facing out into the street, and dust had gathered over all of the wires and contraptions. A low whirl of cooling fans echoed into the background, and in the center of it all, Cyborg Noodle sat plugged into a series of wires that trailed across the wood floor like roots and disappeared into the their various power sources. Her shoulders were slumped and her eyes were black, but electricity thrummed across her pale skin, and Noodle allowed herself a moment to stare at the copy for the first time since they’d fought at Point Nemo.

It came with a strangeness she had a hard time describing even to herself.

 

Caution directed her steps when she crept across the room, careful not to trip or disturb anything that looked important. She could see the button that would pull the robot into consciousness, and it looked threatening.

 

It wasn’t a habit of hers to be indecisive.

 

She brought her palm up to the machine, and pushed.

 

For a second, nothing happened. Then, with what seemed to be a great mechanical effort, a series of lights lit up on the power source, twinkling and flashing. Sparks jumped across where the wires connected into the robot’s head. The whole ordeal buzzed to life, and Cyborg Noodle lifted her head, and opened her eyes.

 

“Hello,” Noodle said.

 

The robot blinked.

 

“Do you know where you are,” Noodle said lowly.

 

There was no response. The cyborg fidgeted. Slowly and carefully, she turned her head upwards to examine the room, her eyes traveling meticulously across the walls and the machinery, the window by Noodle with the curtains drawn low. Sparks crackled in the corner, electricity dancing down the cords connected to her head and jumping into the outlets in the walls.

 

“You’re in a flat in London.”

 

Her mouth twitched.

 

“We took you from the beach,” Noodle continued. “In the Pacific. Do you remember?”

 

The silence was very, very long. It was as if Noodle was speaking to the wall. The cyborg was looking around as if she hadn’t heard a word that had been said to her. After the initial shock of her startup, she looked almost a little bored.

 

Noodle frowned.

 

“I know that you can speak, so speak,” She demanded, the focused stare of the robot unnerving her. “You don’t have to hide it anymore.”

 

“I never did.”

 

Her voice. There was a burnt vibration to the edge of it, and it occurred to Noodle that she had probably damaged the robot’s voice box when she had been— when the cyborg had—

 

“You never what?” She asked, the words registering then.

 

Cyborg blinked again. It was a slow, unimpressed sort of thing, and it made Noodle feel very much looked at. Seeing her speak into the calm of the flat was a stark misplacement from where they had last exchanged words, and the bizarre nature of it seemed to linger between them.

 

“I never hid anything," The robot said again. "They rarely asked me things. They did not ask if I could speak.”

 

The tinny sound of her voice echoed off the walls of the dark room. It took Noodle a moment to process what she’d heard, and when she did, something frightening and shocked seemed to sink in her stomach.

 

“Not even 2D?” She said, before she could stop herself. Cyborg’s shoulder twitched, and Noodle would have missed it if she hadn’t already been looking at her— something like surprise flashed across the robot's face for a fraction of a second before her expression went still again.

 

“No.” The silence that followed was tenuous before the cyborg spoke again. “When I was born on to the island, I was not initially aware that 2D knew how to speak at all.”

 

It took Noodle a moment to decipher what this meant. When she finally did, it felt like a slap.

 

“He didn’t speak at first?” She said quietly, a cold dread growing in the tips of her fingers. “How long was he on Plastic Beach before he spoke?” And then, after a short pause: “When you were _born_?”

 

The robot’s eyes narrowed. Light sparked next to her temples.

 

“Did you boot me up to ask me these things?” She said, her voice lower than it had been a few moments ago, something guarded in it.

 

It occurred to Noodle that she had completely forgotten why she’d come upstairs to the room she’d been avoiding for the last couple of weeks in the first place. The original reason now seemed stale and ridiculous. She answered honestly anyway.

 

“Murdoc was asking for you.”

 

The robot shifted at the sound of his name. Almost all at once, the artificial emotion that had been emitting from her seemed to scatter, and when she looked at Noodle, her eyes were cold and devoid.

 

“I’m allowed to leave?” She asked, and the question jarred Noodle in a way she hadn’t expected. Her response didn't come immediately, though, and for the first time, she looked away from the Cyborg, towards the door.

 

“Of course you are,” She said finally. “But you can’t— you can’t hurt anyone. You can’t hurt 2D.”

 

Something cracked in the neutral air of the robot, and for an extremely odd moment, Cyborg pulled the end of her lip up in annoyance, twitching and mechanical. It took Noodle a moment to realize what she was looking at: an almost perfect imitation of Murdoc's poisonous sneer.

 

“Of course I won’t,” She said icily, and although it was the most human thing Noodle had seen her do since waking, it made a jolt of irritation spike through her almost immediately.

 

“Don’t put on an act, alright,” Noodle said, an edge sounding clear in her voice. “I know what you are.” The robot froze. “You wouldn’t understand. Russel— 2D— he’s very important to me.”

 

Cyborg’s eyes narrowed to slits. Her limbs had gone rigid, and when she leaned forwards, her dark bangs drew shadows over her eyes.

 

“If that were the case,” She said darkly, “Why did it take you so long to come _get_ him?”

 

Noodle jerked back as if she’d been struck. Panic and anger rushed through her, and in one furious sporadic movement, she slammed her hand back on to the button on the generator.

 

The robot slumped over nearly immediately. Her face was framed by her choppy hair, but the ghost of a smile seemed to still be stuck across her features, even as the power hummed out behind her, all of the lights and sparks that had adorned the machine previously fizzling out into the dark.

 

The silence of the room was deafening.

 

 

 

Noodle didn't wait another moment before she scrambled back across the room. She threw open the door and slammed it on her way out.


	3. 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi this fic is about the ocean being asleep and not having a home
> 
> i dont have any self control to space out the updates so here's a special new years one. it is short :'D
> 
> i like writing these two though! It's a challenge writing murdoc as the worst but not making him like just.. the Worst. anyways the best 2d/murdoc characterization i've ever read on here has been from ao3 user @sonata in their fic the answer. god it is so good go read that instead of this!! then come back and read this

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2D didn’t remember falling asleep, but someone was shaking him awake regardless.

 

“Blimey,” He said, and his mouth tasted like stale cigarettes and bile. When he opened his eyes, Murdoc’s mismatched glare was boring into him, one red eye bright in a murderously angry gaze.

 

2D closed his eyes again.

 

“It’s 4 in the bloody mornin’, Mudz,” he croaked, and yawned. He was aware of the bassist’s sleep patterns— it didn’t matter what time it was. Murdoc seemed to be always awake, unless he was blacking out.

 

“We got something to talk about,” He growled, and in one swift motion, grabbed 2D’s wrist and yanked him out of his bed and onto the floor. 2D squawked.

 

“Oi! Murdoc, c’mon,” he whined. “I was just gettin’ to sleep, now I have to start all over again—“

 

“You knew she could talk,” the bassist hissed. “She had been talkin’ to _you.”_

 

2D rubbed his head where he had hit it on the side of the bed. Murdoc was glaring absolute daggers down at him, and it took a minute for the words to sink in.

 

“The Cyborg?” He said tiredly, looking over at the clock. 4:21. He didn’t know if he should have expected anything else.

 

“Yes, Tusspot, use what little brain functions you have left to keep up.” He crossed his arms sullenly, and 2D sighed. The room was beginning to take shape around him, his eyes adjusting to the dark, and Murdoc stood in over the mess that had been piling up like he belonged in it.

 

They hadn’t spoken much after moving into the flat. 2D slept a lot for the first couple of weeks since coming back from the tropics, and he wasn’t sure if it had at all helped him or not. It wasn’t as if he’d been tired. But there was a sluggish drag to what he was seeing when he opened his eyes now, how he perceived his own body moving in front of him, like it was only half happening. It had been dim and cool in his bedroom. He’d thought of a room in a museum you’d preserve a dead thing, and he’d laid under the cold sheets and listened to the whir of the ac unit that Noodle had shoved into the window, watching the shadows crawling across the floor.

 

Every once in a while, he would hear shouting downstairs, muffled and urgent. It never lasted long, though. Murdoc would slam the door to the basement and slink away to nurse his wounds until the next blowout, and Noodle would fume and pace around the kitchen, her boots making a prominent noise on the hardwood floor.

 

They were like this, now, 2D though. _Murdoc_ was like this.

 

He didn’t want to think about it. It was a sentiment he had been feeling a lot since they’d left the beach.

 

All the same, being woken up in the early hours of the morning to be insulted was not a concept that was new to him. It was, however, one he could do without.

 

“I thought you’d been the one to fix it so that she could talk,” He mumbled, rubbing at his eyes. “So she could… I’unno…do stuff better.”

 

“Do… stuff… better,” Murdoc repeated slowly. 2D wasn’t positive if he was saying it in shock, annoyance, or both. He was very suddenly thinking about his pillow, and the picture of the cat in the hall.

 

Murdoc smacked him again.

 

“OW— Muds, I’m awake!” He whined, glaring up at the angry man in the dark.

 

“You were fallin’ asleep again,” Murdoc accused. “What the bloody hell did you two get on about? She’s practically a talking toaster, what could she possibly have to say to _you_?”

 

Despite the threatening nature of the entire ordeal, 2D knew that it was a vaguely valid question. His mind drifted back to the day on the balcony, losing his cigarette—the pain of remembering a lost Noodle, and the embarrassment of resenting the new one. What had she said to him? _I’m not stupid. I know what I am._

 

She knew. Even then. She was learning. She _could_ learn.

 

The third time Murdoc hit him, he yelped and flailed to the side, knocking over the clock radio and a shoe that had been perfectly balanced on the nightstand lamp. It fell and hit him in the head in a way that was almost mockingly slapstick.

 

“Would ya cut it out!” He howled angrily, holding the sore spot on his skull. “You’re gonna give me a bloody welt!”

 

“I wouldn’t hav’ta hit ya if you didn’t keep zonin’ out into nothin’ like yer recoverin’ from a lobotomy! What did she say to you??”

 

“Why don’t you just ask her yourself? She can talk now!” 2D said furiously, glaring at Murdoc. He was awake now, there was no helping it.

 

Murdoc rolled his eyes. “Incredible deduction, Two-Dee,” he deadpanned, drawing out the name in annoyance. “Hadn’t figured that one out for myself, thanks.”

 

The singer felt something like anger flare up in his stomach, a white hot lick of a greater grudge that had been growing for years like a fungus in his frontal lobe, next to the dents in his skull that had been put there by the same person who stood before him now. The words that came out of him were toxic, and he regretted them the moment he spit them out.

 

“We wouldn’t be on about nothin’ ‘cept for what a pathetic bloody _drunk_ you were!”

 

The silence was deafening.

 

2D felt every muscle in his body tense in anticipation of the incredible, black-out blow he was absolutely almost certain he was about to receive in the next three to four seconds. Murdoc was gaping like a fish that had just been gutted. He drew back, eyes wide as saucers, and when he moved to speak, the only thing that left his mouth at first was a short, high squeak of a breath that was so heavily concentrated with liquor it may have very well qualified as a fire hazard in the flat. His grip on 2D’s arm was so tight the singer was beginning to lose all feeling in his hand, and the pins and needles were making his fingers itch. He was counting down the seconds. He couldn’t bear to watch. They’d call him 3-Dents after this.

 

It never came.

 

Murdoc did something he had never done before.

 

He let go.

 

He sat down on the bed.

 

When 2D opened his eyes, Murdoc was staring at him with an expression he had never seen Murdoc wear before. It was molten-lava furious. But it was… smug.

 

“ ‘Ow long have we known each other, 2D,” He asked.

 

The question was dripping with condescension. 2D had never been more scared to answer something he knew the correct response to in his entire life. His muscles were beginning to hurt from the tenseness the anxiety wrought. Carefully and slowly, he pulled his arm back to his chest, rubbing it with his other hand but not without continuing to stare at the bassist.

 

“Uh,” He said.

 

Murdoc’s left eye twitched.

 

“August 15th, 1997,” He slurred. 2D blinked. “I was performing some less-than-savory acts to obtain the methods I would use to make the greatest music of all time. My car. Your head. Stop me if you remember all this.”

 

“I remember,” 2D said, but not quite brave enough to sound as annoyed as he wanted to. This was unexplored territory. In all the time he had known Murdoc, the older man had never once passed up an opportunity to bash in 2D’s skull when he was being smart— it was quite literally Murdoc’s oldest pastime. It was putting him on edge. No version of this had ever happened before. 2D shifted his weight away from the mattress, and looked very quickly towards the door.

 

“20 years,” Murdoc said slowly. “That was 20 years ago— _Stu_ ,” and 2D’s blood ran cold. He didn’t want to know what Murdoc was about to say next. He knew that whatever it would be, it would be terrible. Why did he remember the exact date? “I know you. I’d like to think I know you well enough. So here’s some food for bloody thought, if you can manage it well enough on a good day,” He growled, and leaned in close. His eyes were murderous, and suddenly very, very sober. 2D shrank back.

 

“You’d be fuckin’ nowhere if I hadn’t dragged you from that keyboard store, all the way to that island, and everywhere in between. I want you to think very carefully about who knows you best in this flat, because while you and the brave little toaster who talks may be having a nice chat about _my_ habits,” He said, and dragged out his next words like he was pulling the world’s most disgusting laundry out to air in front of an audience, “Don’t think I haven’t noticed a special little habit of your own that _hasn’t changed_ since Point Nemo.”

 

What?

 

2D frowned.

 

“You—,” He started.

 

He stopped.

 

The room tilted for a second, then replaced itself perfectly, Murdoc looking down at him on the floor from the bed, entirely unimpressed, but unable to stop himself from looking just a little bit satisfied.

 

2D thought he was anxious before. This was nothing compared to the cold of a minute ago. He stared at the other man in shock before looking down at the filthy carpet as if his life depended on it. Shame welled into his chest like cement filling a mold. It was a low blow, even for someone who seemed to take extreme pleasure in delivering low blows. 2D had assumed it was off limits because he himself considered if off limits on a personal level. He forgot sometimes. He just forgot. Murdoc spoke his next words like he was sliding a knife into the ribs of the singer— very carefully, and very precise.

 

“What do you think Noodle would have to say if she found out our frontman was still covering his tracks as a pill popper.”

 

The question hung in the air between them, sharp and grossly apparent. 2D closed his eyes. He didn’t used to need it. He used to pretend he didn’t. The stifling feeling of the island felt like it was coming back to him all at once, empty and suffocating and reeking of the ocean mist. Breathing in and out. The waves coming to shore, and then drifting back out to sea.

 

He wanted to throw up. _Frontman for what_ , he thought— they weren’t a band anymore. They didn’t even make music, these days.

 

“Can’t I just go back to bed,” 2D said, feeling thoroughly beaten. Murdoc made a frustrated noise.

 

“The Cyborg,” he insisted.

 

2D sighed. His head was beginning to ache again.

 

“She asked about Noodle. She wanted to know what she was like.” 2D paused. “She said she knew she was— that she was a— replacement.” He dug his fingers into the flesh of his arms, crossing them over his wiry frame.

 

For the first time since he had entered the room, Murdoc looked surprised. He leaned back on the bed and frowned. “What did you say?” he asked. And then, even more bizarrely, “A replacement?”

 

2D looked up from the floor. He felt exhausted. When he spoke, his voice was quiet. “I told her about her. I told her Noodle was… you know,” He said, and felt his face heat up. “The second part was—,” he started, and stopped again.

 

“What?” Murdoc said angrily, sharp with an edge of hysterics. “It was _what_?”

 

It couldn’t be said between them, but it was awful. 2D thought it was awful. He didn’t know what Murdoc thought. He didn’t think he’d ever really known what Murdoc thought about anything, anymore. They stared at each other for a long moment, the impasse unreachable and dark and shameful. 2D ducked his head to look at the floor again.

 

“Geez, Muds,” he mumbled finally. “I’unno if she was wrong about it.”

 

The expression on Murdoc’s face was unreadable. For a moment, 2D though he saw something like embarrassment on the face of the bassist.

 

He stood up quickly from the bed.

 

“Go back to sleep,” Murdoc said angrily, and stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

 

2D looked at the clock. 4:28. He took a deep, hollow breath.

 

He wasn’t getting to sleep anytime soon.


	4. 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY NEW YEAR!! i've spent a lot of my vacation patching this fic together from the frankenstein parts i had of it earlier in the year and i cant believe how much FUN ive had  
> anyway i love russel/del and this whole fic was a trick. You’re reading russel/del fic now and im sitting on my russdel throne, laughing at you  
> also i love!! noodle and russel’s relationship but i feel like a lot of times in fic it gets cast aside or infantilizes noodle so that russels dynamic with her is like, how he would take care of a toddler. ...maybe it was like that when she was younger but after all this time their relationship has definitely matured into something more like a young adult would have with their parent especially after going through trauma together. They’re a team now, Team Band!!!  
> The last time i was in flatbush i was drunk and eating a hot dog and someone slapped the hotdog out of my drunk little hands. O i miss new york  
> Ok enjoy!! I have the next chapter written because i split this one in half w it so its a little shorter, and the next two after that I THINK i might shuffle some things around. Didn’t intend to do everyone’s pov but now we’re here i guess lol. Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Russ is dreaming he is down on King’s Highway, sitting on the corner by the five and dime drinking pop when Del asks him about the demon. He knows it’s a memory, but he doesn’t try to wake up. He doesn’t, because he knows Del is in this memory.

 

Brooklyn in the summer is hot as hell. Russel thinks people forget about this, they get caught up in the lights of Manhattan, the gentrified parts of Williamsburg and the crumbling docks of Red Hook, everything is turned romantic by someone else, they forget the muggy, thick air of New York in the summer. Flatbush is noisy and it stinks like garbage left out to rot in the sun. The asphalt is all melting and the waves of heat are rising off the street in blurs, cars rush past the two of them on the curb like where they’re going is going to be any cooler. Russel loves days like this, tired days, loitering on the street like it’s an activity, and not a distraction, and the whole day goes by with nothing to show for it. He sits with Del on the curb, and they talk, and Russel could talk to him forever, and never get tired, because that’s what they have. His Dr. Pepper is ice cold and water drips from the cool can; when he drinks it, he can feel the freezing go all the way down to his stomach. Del hasn’t even opened his soda yet. He’s saying something else.

 

“Can I ask you somethin’, Russ?” He’s leaning his weight on his hands behind him, propping himself up with his legs splayed out on to the street. Even though the sun is shining hot down on them, Del is still looking at Russel with squinted eyes. He thinks he’s trying to be cool, to ask it casually, but Russel knows better. He knows Del too well for casual questions. He sees the look on his face, and the way his eyes shift, and he knows: he’s curious about something. And Del is stubborn as hell.

 

Russel tries to convince himself the cold in his stomach is still from the Dr. Pepper.

 

“You askin’ me or you? You sound pretty nervous,” He says, looking over at the other kid on the curb with raised eyebrows, trying to smile, trying to believe the weight of the air is from the heat, and not from the way Del is looking at him.

 

“Man, you know what I mean,” Del sighs. “I don’t wanna ask you if you don’t wanna answer, though. ‘Cause it’s cool with me if you don’t answer. But I wanna ask ‘cause I been wonderin’ about it for a while now.”

 

Russ puts holds his pop a fraction tighter in his hands. He can feel the perspiration from the can dripping down his fingers.

 

“Yeah,” He says, and looks down at the pavement. “You can, if you want.”

 

There’s a silence. The other boy considers this. Then he cracks open his pop, shakes his head, smiling a little. “Nah, you don’t wanna.”

 

“Del!” When Russel looks up again, he really is smiling, but the anxiety from earlier is still sitting in his stomach like a rock. Del squints up at the sun and pulls the rim of his hat up, adjusting it in the heat.

 

“No man, I can tell. It’s okay. I’ll lay off. Don’t wanna be nosy.” He slurps his Dr. Pepper extra loud, the way he knows bothers Russ just to tease him, and Russel looks back down at the curb again with his mouth pulled into a frown.

 

“I know what you’re gonna ask, anyways,” He says, all quiet, but he knows Del can hear him. Del, who isn’t saying anything. The traffic light down the street goes from green to yellow to red. Neither of them speak for a minute. Russel sips his pop and sighs heavy. The air’s thick from the heat. That’s what he tells himself.

 

“It’s ok,” He mumbles. “It was a while ago.”

 

A car alarm shouts in the distance.

 

“What was it like?” Del asks. Russel can just make it out, his voice having gone quieter.

 

He thinks of the school, then— the halls of Xavier, harrowing and cold through the eyes of something else. The blood, too much of it, every terrible thing it used him for, completely powerless to stop it. Father Merrin yelling while all of the horror nearly burst out of his head.

 

He closes his eyes.

 

“It was like fire under my skin, and it wanted to get out. I could feel the devil in me, and I think he knew, too.”

 

Del doesn’t say anything, and Russel is thankful for it. He feels a warm arm wrap around his shoulder, hot and sticky with sweat. When he opens his eyes, Del isn’t looking at him— he’s gazing out onto the street with the controlled stare of a person who is very much trying to look nowhere at all.

 

“I shouldn’t have asked,” He says, and Russel shakes his head and smiles.

 

“I don’t mind.”

 

Del sighs. Pats his shoulder and leans back again.

 

“I’m tellin’ you man, you don’t have to say that.”

 

Russel looks down at the street.

 

“I don’t mind if it’s you askin’,” He mumbles. He hears Del laugh, and the pavement looks suddenly darker. Something is different. An aluminum artificial light scatters across the streets. The bright glow of a 7/11 sign. His stomach drops, but he looks back up anyway, even though he already knows what he’ll see. He’s had this dream plenty of times.

 

Del is looking at him, dead eyes and shirt spattered with blood, grinning on the sidewalk like they hadn’t been shoved so mercilessly forwards in time, like it was still the last good day. When he smiles, his teeth are shockingly white, but his voice isn’t his at all. It’s the demon.

 

It isn’t fair for this to be turned into a nightmare. He loved this afternoon.

 

“Then I’ll always ask if you need me too, Russ. I’m not goin’ anywhere on you.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Russel jolts awake.

  


Noodle is standing next to him, and she looks thoroughly shaken. She tries to smile, but it’s a pained, desperate thing, and she clutches the bag of whatever she’s holding in her arms closer to her like if she let go of it it would fly out of her hands. Russel thinks for the millionth time how he’s failed her, and then pushes it away as the remnants of the dream dissipate as well. He didn’t fail anyone. She’s safe, standing in front of him. None of them are okay, but all of them are safe here at the flat.

 

It doesn’t make him feel any better.

 

He smiles back.

 

“Good Morning,” She says, and sets the bag down. The sun is already rising over London’s horizon, commuters waking up to begin the trek to the heart of the city. “Were you— you were having a dream?”

 

“Yeah,” He says, and his voice is clear today, the deep sound of it echoing away from the cold roof. Noodle grins, and this time, it’s real. She’s pleased to hear him talk. He can see for a second, her in her radio helmet and jacket, 11 years old and bursting to see the world. It leaves as soon as he’s thought of it. “Don’t worry. It was a good dream.” He doesn’t mention the end.

 

It seems to ease her though, and she relaxes before saying, “Well, I brought you some breakfast. It seems like you shrank a bit overnight! Yesterday the satellite from the tellie was poking your ear— now it doesn’t even touch the top of your head.”

 

He does feel a little smaller, but he didn’t figure it had anything to do with his physical size.

 

“Bagels?” He asks, and she hands the bag to him.

 

Russel eats 4 of them before squinting down at her.

 

“How are D and Murdoc?”

 

Noodle freezes, just for a second, and then sits down on the gravel of the roof next to him, faking something nonchalant.

 

“You know,” She says, and her tone is controlled, light. “The same, I suppose. Murdoc won’t come out of the cellar. 2D got out of bed yesterday before I did— that was new. But he was smoking in the kitchen, and he didn’t even seem to notice when I walked in.”

 

“He was never a morning guy,” Russel says, and for some reason this makes Noodle laugh. It only lasts a few seconds. The nervous air around her returns, and it makes Russel look down again.

 

He thinks of 2D, sitting up on the rooftop two nights ago chain smoking, and frowns.

 

“What happened,” He asks flatly, and it makes her jump.

 

“Nothing!” She takes a bagel from the bag, picks at it with her purple painted nails. “Well...I… I did something yesterday. Something happened.”

 

Russel sits up. A few birds that had been sitting on the edge of the building adjacent to them squak and fly away, irritated by the disturbance.

 

“He try to hurt you?” He asks quickly, already angry. Noodle shakes her head furiously, eyes wide. She doesn’t need to ask who ‘He’ is.

 

“No! No. It was— I did it, I chose— I turned the— the robot, the cyborg replica Murdoc made. I went into the old office and I took her off stationary. We talked.”

 

Russel looks shocked. It takes him a moment, but he eases himself back down slowly, not taking his eyes off the guitarist.

 

“Why?” He asks, and Noodle doesn’t even know how to respond. She grasps for answers, looking away, out into the skyline.

 

“2D came up the stairs from the basement,” She starts. “Said Murdoc had been— asking for her.” He’d been furious when he’d barged up into the kitchen, buzzed and angry, shouting for the robot. It hadn’t come close to matching his outrage when Noodle had explained to him that he wasn’t to turn Cyborg back on. She hadn’t even thought to ask why he’d even needed her in the first place, just like she’d judged 2D for.

 

“I went to the fourth floor to talk to it— her. She,” Noodle says, and it comes out of her before she can stop herself. The thing she’d been edging around since she’d first hit the button on.

 

“Russel, before then, I didn’t think— she just seemed like a machine wearing my face. But she was so— she was _real_ . When we spoke, she was alive. I know that she’s an android, and Murdoc built her, but— she told me she was _born_ on the island. And we’re just keeping her up there like some,” She threw up her hands, frustrated. “Some prisoner. We took her from the beach but then we just stuck her in there. One cell to the next.”

 

Russel is watching her with a look on his face Noodle can only interpret as very, very— proud. Then something in it darkens, and he frowns at her.

 

“She’s still off standby, then?”

 

Noodle winces.

“No… I... ,” She mumbles, and hangs her head and sighs. “I got angry and shut her off again.”

 

The roof is silent.

 

Russel pops three more bagels into his mouth.

 

“I’m so selfish,” She whispers, and she really means it. Just because she can’t handle her own guilt, shutting down the robot on a whim. An enormous hand pats her shoulder, and when she looks up, Russel is smiling down at her. He looks very tired.

 

“No, you aren’t. This isn’t black and white. It’s hard for you, and that’s alright.” He shrugs. “I mean, the situation ain’t alright. But it’s alright to feel conflicted about it. She’s,” He struggles, and goes with, “it would hurt me too, if I were you. But I think you’ve got a point.” He pulls his hand away. “We shouldn’t keep her up there.” He pauses. “As long as she won’t try to kill you again.”

 

Noodle looks at her feet. “I don’t think she will.”

 

They sit in silence. Someone walking past the flat laughs, and the sound of it drifts up to the roof and before fading away. Noodle shifts her weight, pulling her knees up to her chest.

 

“She told me when 2D first got to Point Nemo, he didn’t speak.”

 

Russel turn his head in surprise, pausing mid-bite. “What?”

 

“I don’t know for how long,” She continues. “Maybe just a few days. But I think it was longer than that. She said he didn’t even know he could, at first.”

 

Russel drags his hand over his face. “Jesus,” He murmurs.

 

“I think we should set him up to talk to someone. I feel like he’s hiding something from me, and I can’t stand it,” Noodle frets. She stops then, and laughs very suddenly, high and dark. It’s a startling sound, and it makes Russel’s heart break just a little. “ちくしょ. Just look at us. We’re an absolute mess. Eating bagels out of bag on a roof. You’re enormous still. There’s an evil copy of me in the room below here.” She scuffs her trainers against the gravel. “I’m so tired, Russel.”

 

“Hey,” Russel says. She looks up, her the bags under her eyes more prominent than ever.

 

He raises a bagel to her.

 

“These are some aces bagels.”

 

It’s stupid. He knows it is. But she snorts and looks away, the tears held at bay for now, and her smile is worth it.

 

“Things will get better,” He says more seriously, and he can hardly do anything to keep the earnestness out of his voice. “They will. It just takes time.”

 

Noodle shakes her head.

 

“Get smaller sooner,” She says. “Then they’ll get better. I’d like you in the flat. Not on top of it.”

 

He knows she doesn’t mean it to be cruel, but a wash of guilt comes over him all the same, and he can feel his smile crack.

 

“Anyway,” She says, unaware of any of the wallowing going on beside her. “Let’s meditate for a bit while it’s still quiet—  before the street gets too busy.”

 

The cars always ruin it. Russel dusts off his hands, and nods.

 

“Sounds good to me,” he says, and she beams.

 

He already knows mindfulness isn’t very well on his plate today, but Noodle always makes him want to try.

 


	5. 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> of course i didn't forget about this! i had a january deadline for some not-fanfiction writing i needed to get done, and it's done now :)  
> i never intended to put murdoc's POV in here and i don't think i will try again. i think it's more interesting when we don't see whats going on inside his head. that being said i quite like the second part of this! as always thank you for reading, your comments are always so sweet!!

  
  


 

 

 

 

Murdoc Niccals didn’t dream anymore. He slept like the dead, and when he woke, his re-entry to consciousness could regularly be classified as rocky at best, and at worse, deeply traumatizing. 

 

Recently, it had been a bit of a coin toss.

 

The basement had become his by no discussion had by anyone; a haven to him while Noodle and Russel sat on the roof doing God knows what. Probably eating Quinoa made by fair trade farmers or making bloody friendship bracelets or talking about him, Murdoc Niccals, while he sat in the basement pickling his own guts in shit gin. They were thick as thieves these days, and Murdoc didn’t have the patience to think about why this irritated him so thoroughly, and so frequently. He could barely even set foot on the first floor without Noodle jumping out behind every corner to bite his head off about something. For the first couple of weeks in the flat it had been like seeing a ghost. Even her voice was surprising to him. Then the ghost would shout at him about something ridiculous like laundry or being too rough with 2D, and the jarring of experience of it all would quickly turn stale and overwhelming. Gone was the fiery guitarist that had played karate on their tour buses and rode her tricycle through Kong like a tiny Hell’s Angel. Murdoc didn’t know this version of her. She’d grown into someone with razor sharp convictions, a loose lid on her temper and a quality of stubborness not to be underestimated, all on her own.

 

It was like fighting with a mirror. He couldn’t believe how similar they’d turned out to be. It was in this way, too, that he wasn’t surprised that she disliked him so much.

 

The basement was a wreck and he was drunk. The needle had started to bump the center of record that was spinning on the turntable a long time ago, but he hadn’t bothered to flip it over. The only thing that was being broadcast was static. 

 

Shower. He should shower, maybe. He didn’t really care all that much. Bottles were strewn everywhere, and he vaguely considered sneaking out the back to replenish the gin at the shop ‘round the corner, but it would mean wrestling the task of making his way up the long, crooked staircase to the kitchen.

 

Not like you’ve got anything else to bloody do, he thought grimly.

 

The stairs blurred in his vision but he hauled himself up to the landing, a headrush nearly sending him tumbling into the wall. A sliver of golden light was dashed across the tile from under the door, and he squinted down at it as voices started to filter through the wood, his focus waning.

 

“...tell you about it before I did it, and if you’re really uncomfortable with it and opposed to it— ,”

 

That’s Noodle, then, his brain slurred. 

 

“I don’t mind, alright,” a different voice replied. Quieter. Farther away. 2D, he thought, and swayed. They were arguing? “If you an’ Russ think it’s fine, it’s fine with me.”

 

Murdoc didn’t have to see Noodle’s face to be able to tell she was struggling. She didn’t even know the worst of it, he thought to himself. She probably couldn’t tell, but 2D had actually improved since being on Plastic Beach— this was him  _ better _ , and it was still a shitshow. He thought of long days in the studio, 2D staring out into nothingness, white eyes with an empty gaze out on to an endless ocean horizon.

 

He really did need more gin.

 

“You think maybe you’ll go out today?” Noodle asked in a small voice. 2D didn’t respond. 

 

Murdoc hesitated with his hand over the knob. He pictured her face, angry and sad all at once, and then he thought very suddenly of the Cyborg, her grin wide and violent.

 

Slowly, he made his way back down the stairs.

  
  
  
  


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The fourth floor was colder than normal. Noodle lingered outside the door a bit, biting at the chipped paint on her nails before slowly opening the door and slipping inside.

 

It was like she had left a few minutes ago. The room buzzed with electricity as all of the machinery around her whirred and hummed, and in the center of it all, Cyborg Noodle sat on the floor with her head hung. Noodle was disturbed to see the grin she had left her with when she had powered her down the previous day could still be seen vaguely across the face of the robot.

 

She had to make her way carefully through all of the wires. Then, for a third time, she raised her hand to the power source, and pushed the button on.

 

The delay was short-lived. Cyborg’s head jerked up very suddenly, her eyes furious and cold.

 

“Don’t do that again,” She said immediately, and her was voice steely. Noodle furrowed her brow, and Cyborg glared furiously at the switch on the generator.

 

Oh. That.

 

“I’m sorry,” She said, and was surprised to find that she meant it. “I suppose that was unfair. But before you say anything else, I need you to understand something.”

 

Noodle knelt down. She took a deep, controlled breath. Her gaze was calm, but starkly serious. The robot stared back.

 

“I did the best I could for my family when they needed me. It may not have been perfect but it was my absolute best. I’m sorry that included hurting you.” She stopped, and hesitated. Her next words were careful.

 

“Listen. I think that maybe we might have started off on the wrong foot. I’ve given it a lot of thought, and it’s…  it’s wrong to keep you up here. You seem to experience the word the same as me or anyone else does, so I can’t leave you in this room hooked up to this awful machine. It isn’t right. I think you should move into the bedroom next to this one, and you should stay. On, I mean. Not like this anymore.”

 

Cyborg binked.

 

“You want me on all the time?” She asked quietly.

 

Noodle’s heart raced, but she nodded. “Yes, I do.”

 

The robot paused. “Did you ask him about this?”

 

Murdoc’s face flashed through Noodle’s mind. She shrugged and feigned confidence.

 

“Murdoc agrees that you shouldn’t be up here alone. He wants you awake, too,” She said.

 

Cyborg blinked, and then smiled in a way that had no niceness to it at all. It was low and smug.

 

“Oh,” She said, and Noodle frowned.

 

“What?”

 

“They didn’t tell me,” the robot said.

 

A spark lit up out of the crown of her head.

 

“Tell you what?” Noodle asked.

 

The machine grinned.

 

“They didn’t tell me you were a liar.” 

 

It felt like a smack. Noodle stared down at her, and then crossed her arms.

 

“I don’t see how it has anything to do with him anyway. He doesn’t even come upstairs long enough to have a conversation with me, much less weigh in on things like this. He’s too terrible right now to stand.”

 

Cyborg frowned at this, and looked angrily down at the floor between her knees.

 

“If I’m going to be on all the time,” She said lowly, “You can’t say things like that about him.”

 

It was something Noodle never would have guessed the android would say. She raised her eyebrows and did her best to hide her shock.

 

“He practically—,” She started, but Cyborg stopped her.

 

“I know how it sounds,” She said, looking at the floor as if she might burn a hole through it. Noodle vaguely wondered if that was something she was actually capable of doing. Laser eyes sounded very Murdoc to her. “But he’s— something is—,” Sparks fizzled by the android’s eyes, and she screwed them shut in frustration. 

 

“Why does my voice sound like this,” She said angrily, and Noodle’s stomach dropped. 

 

“Er,” She said, and squeezed her fingers into her palms. “When we were. When we fought. It must have been… damaged.”

 

This seemed to take the robot by surprise.

 

“You did this to me?” She asked. Her tone was questioning, startled. Noodle looked away from her to the floor, mortified to realize that what she was feeling was shame. Her silence echoed in the room.

 

“They told me you were good,” Cyborg said quietly. 

 

Noodle’s head jerked up.

 

“They— told you about me?” She asked, incredulous. It hadn’t occurred to her that they would talk about much of anything at Plastic Beach, and she immediately felt stupid for even assuming such a thing. It was a long time. Of course they talked.

 

Didn’t they? About what, then?  _ Her _ ?

 

The robot seemed to spasm, and then move its head awkwardly up, and then down.

 

Nodding. She was nodding.

 

“Yes,” She replied. “Not much. It was difficult. I asked 2D once. He told me…” She seemed to be reaching for it in her head, her eyes seeing something else before she came back to. “That you believed there was good in everyone. He said that  _ you _ were good.” 

 

She brought a hand to her throat where the marks on her neck still remained, angry and dark.

 

Noodle had to force the lump in her throat down before she spoke again. When she did, her voice was hoarse.

 

“2D is kind like that,” She said.  _ Or he was when I knew him. _

 

The robots eyes snapped back to hers. 

 

“I attacked you on the roof because I thought you were going to kill him,” She said simply.

 

Noodle flinched. She wasn’t sure what made her more uncomfortable— the idea that the cyborg could talk about this so casually, or the fact that she wasn’t sure she  _ hadn’t _ intended on killing Murdoc that day. She’d felt something murderous in her blood on the tower, the hot sun beating down on her arms, and when it had left her she’d felt empty and cold, and Murdoc was still in her life the way he’d always been.

 

“That’s,” Noodle said, but didn’t even know what she’d intended to say. They needed to escape this rabbit hole. She wasn’t ready for it yet.

 

“I put some of my old clothes in the next room, and made the bed for you there,” She said instead. “I was going to ask what size you are, but then I realized how silly that would be.”

 

The robot looked bored by this. She cocked her head, and blinked. “Are my weapons there too?”

 

It was phrased disturbingly innocently. “No.”

 

Cyborg seemed to deflate at this response. “Oh.” She perked up again. “Not even my carpet bomb?”

 

Noodle was beginning to question if she had really thought all of this through. A distinct ache was starting to pull through her temples. “No. Especially not that.”

 

The android sighed. Then, she raised her hand to her head, and with no warning, yanked two chords out of her skull. They made a noise like amp wires connected to nothing would, and then seemed to crackle out. She dropped them to the floor with a clatter, and then raised her eyes to the girl by the door, bangs shadowing her eyes. 

 

“Do you need anything else?” She said, and even though her voice was damaged, Noodle was still amazed at her innate ability to echo the minute mannerisms that she must had observed from Murdoc from all their time together. A casual cruelty, a vague disregard.

 

“Do you?” Noodle asked, and was disappointed at how defensive her voice sounded.

 

The robot pulled out two more wires, this time from her neck.

 

“No. And I think I can find the room next door on my own.” The wires clattered to the ground. 

 

Silence fell between them. Noodle figured she’d put up with enough. Cyborg was still pulling chords out of her frame when Noodle turned back towards the door, a sour taste left in her mouth. When her hand reached the doorknob though, she heard the android speak up.

 

“Noodle.”

 

It was like a crack in the air. Noodle had never heard it say her name before.

 

Their name.

 

She didn’t turn around. The robot continued on regardless.

 

“This was your idea?” Her tone was careful.

 

Noodle turned her head to the side. She couldn’t see Cyborg, but she nodded cautiously.

 

There was a long silence. Then:

 

“Why.”

 

It was a fair question. Noodle still found herself not entirely able to answer it. She took a long moment before she spoke. When she did, her voice was quiet.

 

“When I was younger, I was taken from my real parents and placed into a government program designed to train me to do… to hurt people.” She’d never spoken about this so frankly before. She could tell the robot was surprised.

 

“I was one of the best participants in the program. I was very skilled at what we were directed to do. But the things I did were horrible. The only reason I was able to escape was because someone saw that there was an injustice happening, and took an action to stop it. He sent me away from it all, and I was given the chance to build my life on something that wasn’t violence.” Noodle paused. “I… I won’t lie. I don’t like that Murdoc made you. But he made you all the same. And it would be wrong of me to claim... you don’t deserve all of the chances I was given.”

 

She didn’t wait to hear what the robot had to say. She wasn’t sure she had anything to say at all. Her hand squeezed the doorknob, and when she left this time, she didn’t slam anything behind her. She closed it carefully, and after a few moments standing on the landing, she walked back down the stairs.

 


End file.
